The invention relates to document processing in a cross-platform environment.
Electronic documents, such as publication documents, typically have information content such as text, graphics, and tables, and formatting content that directs how to display the information content. The electronic documents may be associated with external files that also may contain text, graphics, and tables. The electronic documents may employ paths to reference the external files. Document publishing systems, which include word processing systems and desktop publishing systems, allow users to create, store and retrieve electronic documents and external files in a directory structure. The directory structure is a part of a file system which is managed by a computer system. The computer system operates under a particular computing platform that includes a particular operating system such as the Macintosh™ operating system, Windows™ operating system or other operating system. A computing platform may maintain a file system, a directory structure, and a path for referencing the electronic documents and external files that has a different structure from another computing platform.
It may be difficult for users to collaborate on a publication project involving electronic documents and external files because each user may be using a different computer system running a different computing platform. For example, a first user may create an electronic document and an external file on a first computer system running a first computing platform. The first computer system forms a path specifying the location of the electronic document and the external file based, in part, on the first computing platform. A second user may attempt to access the same electronic document and external file using a second computer running a second computing platform that is different from the first computing platform. The second computer may not recognize the path referencing the external file created by the first user because the path may not be compatible across different computing platforms.